The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1887-02-03
A Great Railroad Combination.


The secret meeting Of railroad people
at Baltimore, of which brief and unsatis-
factory notices have leaked out, is
undoubtedly in the interest of the new
line which is about to be built by the
Baltimore and Ohio to Birmingham and
ultimately to the gulf, Whether this
line will be an extension of the valley
branch, now in operation as far South as
Lexington, Va, or will leave the main
line at some point in the State of West
Virginia, does not appear to be perfectly
determined. Probably both lines will be
built ultimately. The mineral resources
warrant such an anticipation. The
theory that the Baltimore and Ohio
would avail itself of the already con-.
structed East Tennessee, Virginia and
Georgia, obtaining the control of the
latter By purchase of stock, has been
upset by the requirement of that prop.
erty by the West Point Terminal, which
is small Virginia company organized as
machine for the control of railroad
properties We had occasion to show
several years ago, how tbia Terminal
Company by an investment of about
S5,0OO,OOO was able to control S75,OOO,-
600 worth of Southern roads; its growth
since has been on similar scale of mad.
equacy # ends to means, and its history
is an Indication of what the entire rail-
way system of the United States may in
time become unless its regulation is
taken in hand by the legislative author
ity.
This terminal Company had q balance
sheet September 80, 1854, the latest We
have seen, of slo,7S9,7s6.55, of which
s7,5Oo,OOO represented capital stock. It
agreed last December, if our memory
serve us, to increase its common stock to
s24,o0OO00 and to issue s5,O00,OO0 pre-.
ferred stock. We will, therefore, assume
that its stock is 500, 100000, aud that it
has cost its owners S25 u share, as Ger.
tainly q considerable portion of it did.
The total investment is. consequently,
s7,25o,0Oo.
By the careful management ofthis not
large plant, the Terminal stockholders
are now or soon will be in possession of
2,G69.7S miles Of road, constituting what
is called the Richmond and Danville
system, cf the East Tennessee, Virginia
and Georgia system, 1895 miles, q total
of 4,O65 miles Of completed road, easily
worth s1oo,ooo,ooo, aud already capital
lied ut moro than double that sum.
This is accomplished by the method of
leasing and subleasing, to which there is
no limit.
The East Tennessee system runs from
Bristol on the Virginia line to Memphis
in Tennessee, to Meridian in Mississippi,
and to Brunswick in Georgia with i'm.
portant branches connecting at the Ken.
lucky and Carolina lines with other
roads.
The Danyille or Terminal system runs
from deep water ut West Point on the
Chesapeake thirty eight miles east Of
Richmond to Birmingham in Alabama,
and is in course of construction to Green.
Vile on the Mississippi river. 1t has
valuable branches to Washington city,
Raleigh, Columbia, Augusta, and many
other Southern places.
The union of the two systems makes
The most powerful com bination existing
in the South, east of the Mississippi
river. The entry of the Baltimore and
Ohio into this field will not be long
delayed, however, aud the history of that
corporation is guarantee that it means
business, and will not build merely to
sell out, as the people who owned the
East Tepaessee have been doing in
Northern States as we'll as Southern.
They are the same people who built the
50 .co'' nickel Plate and unloaded it
on tue late William 81. Vanderbilt at q
handsome profit of somewhere between
ten aud twenty million dollars. 1t may
turn out that there is an ulterior purpose
in the great Terminal consolidation
which hos not ye: transpired. But that
will not prevent the Baltimore and Ohio
from coming South, either through Vir.
ginia or through West Virginia, or by
both routes.-Nsy Orleans Picoyune.